bold of you to assume we'll still have elections

what's the obsession of late? Mine's is wild kratts and calling people buttcrack.

we are a pete the cat ONLY household for the... uh... two months it feels like

have patience said:

bold of you to assume we'll still have elections

what's the obsession of late? Mine's is wild kratts and calling people buttcrack.

Lol
Mine just learned "butthole" from my husband so thats been fun to navigate.
He loves doing art, Spidey, rainbows, swinging at the playground, and rewriting songs to be about poop and farts.

Anybody else got old music from when the kids was little and every once in a while you shuffle your way to a Laurie Berkner song or something?

certainly not
i choose to listen to tickle monster.

I had not realized that I neither used nor heard the word butthole for like two decades until my kid turned 7. Holy cow. Then it was butthole nonstop. Now that she's 10, it seems to be on the decline. Thank god. Although there is a significant uptick in the word "vagina" around the house.

Rough news from the Dog house. Grampa Dog finished his adventure on Tuesday last week. Unfortunately, he and my step mother were in Florida at the time, not Indy. On top of that, they'd gone to Florida to spend some time with friends and help them do some home improvement projects, which meant my dad packed their SUV full of all his shit needed to paint, change outlets, plumb, etc.

I flew down Tuesday morning, and discovered the above car situation, along with the fact that I'd be solo roadtripping back to the hoosier state, as my step mother needed to get back here so she could start the VA processing for his cremation and ceremony. She's 80+ and it would take her 3 days to drive back on her own.

rip g dog
sorry to hear that od

So sorry OD. Sucks to lose our fur family

I had breakfast by the hotel pool this morning, and it's winter break, so there are a lot of familes on vacation. Making my way back to my room, I had to navigate the sun chairs, beach bags and running kids.

It made me realize how much I miss kids.

I figured that this is what being a ghost must feel like.

Condolences OD.

A few years ago, Hubby McSpouseface's father (Steve) died. It was really bad and very fast.

He died from a very rare genetic prion disease called CJD. His kids have a 50% chance of inheriting it, and we already did a genetic test on Hubby McSpouseface and he's clear.

Hubby McSpouseface wants to check to see if his dad had any (other) living relatives that had kids because they also might be subject to this. Unfortunately, though, we can't find any information on Steve. He has 3 biological children that we know of (and they all know about the disease), but we can't find any information about his parents, his siblings, or anything about him in general.

Oddly enough we have been in contact with all of Steve's ex-wives (there were 3 that we know of - husb's mom, step mom, and then a mom of a half-brother that was born before husb), and they all said they don't know about his family, he wasn't in the military, and only one of them has a social security number that has the proper location where we believe he was born (but no other information is tied to it that i can find). In fact, husb's step mom said that she only has one security number but knows he has a couple of forged birth certificates, tried to change the name of husb's brother in a divorce (that's a whole different story holy shit), and we just can't find anything about this guy.

I've been working on this for about a month, and I'm just stumped. What the hell do we do? Will Hubby McSpouseface need to do a genetic test, and will that do anything? I'm a great researcher - I'm really good at this stuff generally, but I have no idea what to do about this. I think it's only fair that Hubby McSpouseface know at least a little about his dad's side of the family - at least what country they come from and if he has aunts or uncles.

My wife's grandfather had the same thing. They are a close family(3rd cousins still in some kind of contact) no other cases in 4 generations/50ish people. They think it may have been caused by some venison.

She still can't donate blood, which is a shame because she's O negative.

Yeah that's sucky. There's two ways to get it - by eating wild meat or genetically. The generic versions I guess is much more rare.
I'm sorry that she had to go through it.

Wild Meat was my nickname in college.

ha, same here, same here…

well, it was Mild Wheat but you know, same diff right

I was in the UK eating burgers right in and around when CJD was running rampant. Apparently it takes about twenty-eight years before doctors could be certain anyone from around then didn't have it. I wasn't allowed to donate blood that entire time waiting to see if I was one of the unlucky few.

Parents divorced 45 years ago. Mom and step-mom got Alzheimer’s the same time. I planned lots of trips out this year to support my step-dad and dad with caregiving. This trip, I learned that my step-mom not only opted for MAID but was getting it done while I was out. Glad it was an option for her. Late stage Alzheimer’s ain’t fun and the whole thing generally sucks.

Mom’s waiting until later this year to call it quits.


Not grieving much because I think Ove been doing it for years, in hindsight. Alzheimer’s is one long good bye.

The six year old is taking it hard. The eight year old is soldiering through.

That was unclear. They got Alzheimer’s like 5 years ago, not 45.

damn tiepo
that's a heavy load, I'm very sorry you're going through all of that.

i had to look up maid but had guessed based on context
That's great they have the option
still... what a horseshit disease
my grandfather had it and it was brutal.

love to you, tiepo

Thanks guys.

Step-mom passed peacefully. I ended up being there for it. It was my dad, sister, me, step-mom (obvs), and the doc.

It’s such a bizarre process. There’s no set ritual around it, so it feels a little made up in some way. Almost disrespectful of the event. We are so used to death scenes in movies, in hospital and otherwise, yet this process is really new. We had breakfast, walked the dog, then kind of sat vigil reminiscing about things. I had written a few things that I wanted to let her know. When it reached the hour the doc was supposed to arrive, my dad set up my step-mom on their bed wearing clothes she found comfortable and a blanket. I greeted the doc with my sis and brought her to the room.

The doc asked my step-mom if she knew why she was there and if she was okay with going to sleep and never waking up and my step-mom confirmed it. The doc got the IV set up while my dad cuddled up with my step-mom. He was crying, and my step-mom told him not to worry because he was a big guy. It was remarkable because of her aphasia.

The death itself was fast. I don’t know the names of the drugs and cannot be bothered to look it up, but one makes you euphoric (fentanyl, I think), another makes you fall asleep, and another stops the heart. Her eyes widened, her mouth opened with a little gasp, and then she yawned and closed her eyes and sort of relaxed and then became still. It took maybe three minutes. In that time, I lost her, saw my dad’s heart break, realized how fleeting life is, and detached from all my day to day concerns.

Crazy thing was that my step-mom has had progressively worse aphasia for a year and it was difficult to tell if she was following along with conversations but it became clear to me that she was. On the weekend before she checked out, I spent a lot of time with her. I haven’t been able to visit for 18 months so it was nice to spend more than a phone call with her. With a bit of back and forth and some guessing games where she would blurt out yes when I got it right, it became evident that she was following along, but often didn’t try because it was so exhausting or people were impatient. How horrible.

Anyway, the grief is strange. I miss who she was at the end, but the distance from that version of her lets me more easily grieve who she was before the disease.

That’s a long and heavy one.

Give your family a hug. They’re what really matter.

Thank you so much for writing all of that out and explaining how it happened. How lucky you are to have gotten to spend time with her, and how lucky she was that you were there.
My most sincere condolences to you and your family at this time. I will give my whole family an extra hug tonight.

I am so sorry for your loss, tiepo

Thanks for sharing, tiepo. Pretty incredible.
Sorry for your loss and I wish you the best with what comes next for you.

thanks for sharing that
that's a lot to process.
my best to you and your family through the grief

butterknife said:

what's the carbon offset on 4 babbie's like

lol nice

My little boy is still learning the finer points of egg hunting. Was very excited to find an egg and announce that he found an egg and immediately open it and inspect the contents.

We're getting there though

Also god damn I'm so sorry to hear that tiepo

I'm glad you all got to be with her but I know that doesn't lessen the hurt

My daughter is one week old tomorrow. This has been the best week of my life.

That's so sweet wander. Soak it all in. It's truly the best 💕

congrats!

wander said:

My daughter is one week old tomorrow. This has been the best week of my life.

Congrats! It keeps changing and being awesome and stressful and hilarious and tough and the most beautiful thing.